Video Hall of Fame, Category 2 Winner and new category

I always loved the idea of Marble Madness but I couldn't play for more than five minutes. As soon as my marble went over the edge and into oblivion, I would get a sudden attack of vertigo. Yes, my fear of heights transcended into video games. Sad, I know.

Coming up later - most likely in the afternoon - will the Best of the Rest category, featuring all the other Coin-Op games in a death match battle. There's still time to make your nominations (see the others there). Just remember that we are honoring old school games, pre-Playstation. So anything coin-op before 1994 (but not vector or trackball games, because they've already had their moment) is good for this category.

One of the things I adored about Marble Madness was the sense that it gave you of being in some completely alien universe. Many games give no sense of transport at all; e.g., playing Asteroids didn't, like, feel like being in outer space. The only other game from (roughly) that period that did that was Battlezone -- it provided a visceral quality of being somewhere totally out of this world.